141 Elusive Masks: A Semiotic Approach of Contemporary Acts of Masking 1 Federico Biggio and Victoria Dos Santos* 2 Titolo in italiano: Maschere elusive: Un approccio semiotico ai mascheramenti contemporanei. Abstract: Elusive masks made by artists, designers, and creative citizens are more and more worn during urban protests in order to elude facial recognition software used for mass surveillance programs. The present article discusses some of the semiotic functioning of elusive masks, starting from a exploration of the concept of ‘mask’ and its ritualistic collective functions maintained in contemporaneity. This will allow to analysed some cases studies according to the frst Peircean trichotomy, that of the sign in itself, with the aim of understanding how masks respond to facial recognition systems in urban contexts. The correlation between the natural and the artifcial face is also considered, paying particular attention to the transformations originated by these masks, as an expression of resistance tactics against such computational sur- veillance tactics. Keywords: Mask; Anti-Surveillance; Facial Recognition; Elusion; Ritual * University of Turin. 1. This article is the product of an investigation carried on in the framework of the initiative “Doctoral Scholarships” of the Excellence Department, Philosophy and Educational Sciences, Uni- versity of Turin, Italy, 2019-20. 2. Chapters 2 and 5 were written by Victoria Dos Santos; chapters 3, 4, and 6 were written by Federico Biggio. Introduction and conclusions were written by both authors. Lexia. Rivista di semiotica, 37-38 Volti Artificiali ISBN 978-88-255-3853-3 DOI 10.4399/97888255385337 pp. 141-164 (marzo 2021)